We love Birthdays & we love to celebrate and help our birthday person feel as special as possible. Right during a worldwide crisis/pandemic, it makes things more difficult to really celebrate the traditional way. We recently had Rykel’s birthday & we wanted her to feel as special as possible. Here are 10 ideas you can use to help your BIRTHDAY Person feel special!
#1 SURPRISE MORNINGS
SURPRISE MORNINGS are so fun…We love to keep the Birthday kid inside their room while we QUIETLY decorate as quickly as possible. We do something simple, we take crepe paper and tape it to the sides of their doorway, or the top of the stairs and as they come out they get to bust through..like a football team coming through their team sign-on Homecoming! Hurrah!
This year we took balloons and tied them to the stairs and it made it more festive. In years passed we have blown up balloons and wrote things we loved about the birthday kid and then quietly put them in their room while they were sleeping. So many fun things can be done here!
#2 – Food
Next..Breakfast! Yes we love to make each meal of the day a little more special for the birthday person. Rykel Chose to have granola, but Klai wanted to spice it up a bit, she took some crepes we had the day before and she layered them while adding Nutella in between each layer…making an unbelievably chocolately breakfast cake. She topped it with raspberries and I think Rykel about melted with all the goodness of this breakfast. For Lunch we did simple sandwiches with tons of fruit, Rykel loves fruit. For Dinner we spend more time making sure its their favorite – Rykel chose spaghetti…we made grandma’s homemade spaghetti and everyone was happy!
#3 Birthday Present HUNT!
EARLY PARTY…we love to start the day out with presents, it makes for a quick little party & the birthday girl gets to play the rest of their day with their presents…the KIDS LOVE this! We hide presents all around the house, the other kids love doing this part. They put presents high, low, in the fridge, everywhere. This is such a fun game as they get to hide & the birthday person has fun finding them all.
#4 Online Shopping to the Rescue
Of course opening the presents is always the best part. For staying home it might be hard to find the best present, but we have found amazing things on amazon. And the timing for this party was ok, because Rykel is our BOOK lover, so we found all her needs on Amazon.
#5 FREE Heart Felt GIFT!
THIS PRESENT is easy and CHEAP! I wanted Rykel to feel special and let her know that so many of her friends and family were thinking of her on her special day. I contacted a lot of friends and family a few days before asking them to record a short happy birthday message for Rykel. I asked them to do a simple phone video and text it to me. They were fantastic! Right now I think everyone understands that if their birthday was during this stay home crisis they would want to feel loved. I compiled the videos on IMovie into a short 2-3 minute video, I dropped in a cute background song and that was it. I think this was her favorite gift!
This was definitely a WINNER present! I think if this was the only gift she would have had the best birthday ever!
BIRTHDAY ACTIVITIES
#6 Alone Time to ENJOY Presents!
We like to have activities all day long! This part can be catered to the birthday person. Since Rykel got a TON of books and she loves to read, she wanted to just be left alone to read for a couple of hours! BOOM simple! So we gave her a couple hours, while we did school/housework/work…this was great for everyone!
#7 Drive By Birthday Party
We have some great neighbors and friends. We asked a few friends of Rykel’s in the neighborhood to put up a poster or write in sidewalk chalk a little birthday Message..and they did just that! We took Rykel on a surprise drive and got to see what everyone wrote and a few friends were outside and we were able to say hello from the Truck!
#8 Arts & Crafts
My kids love to make a special gift for the birthday Person. We busted out the paints, went into the yard to get some sunshine & did some rock painting. This may not work for all birthday kids. BUT our youngers loved painting something special for Rykel and she loved decorating some rocks for her room. A little arts and crafts really lifts the spirits when quarantining might be getting to you.
#9 Social Media SPAM
We do a lot on social media, but we have also noticed that our kids communicate with their friends there too. So instead of going to school and making a poster of all the baby pictures of your birthday person when they were little…this is a place to post those really cute embarrassing pics for all to see. We keep it nice and only post the cutest stuff, but this is a super simple way to make them feel special. We do the easy share and post to Instagram and then share it directly to Facebook, we tag the person and then later on in the day we like to READ all the comments from friends and family wishing them Happy Birthday!
#10 LOVE & attention
This is what every person needs is Love & Attention! Having a large family of 6 kids, sometimes each kid doesn’t get enough 1 on 1 time with us parents. We make sure during this special time they GET THAT! WE HUG them extra long, really squeezing – releasing those endorphins to make sure they know they are loved! We set aside time for a late-night talk, book read or movie with just us (maybe other kids too if they want to invite them..but we give them the choice). This is another reminder that gifts & party aside, we LOVE THEM! That’s most important right?! We all just need to know we are loved..and even more on our birthdays! So even if you’re not a touchy-feely hugger…give a HUG today!
Tell me how it goes!
Comment your stay home birthday ideas.
Please share your fun traditions…because we all can learn from each other.
And thanks for stopping by to say hi!
DOWNLOAD: Here is a fun printable to help you plan for your next birthday kid coming up!
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